Down here in the South West, Spring arrived at approximately 6:53am on Saturday 13th March, and started as it meant to go on by resolutely marching round my garden, banging some saucepans and waking up my sleepy crocuses.

I do respect these crocuses, since, as you can see from the photo, they have not been lying in the most comfortable beds. More straw pallet than Egyptian cotton duvet. As my fiancé keeps pointing out to me: although plants do enjoy being coddled and nurtured with gifts of manure and premium compost, a little maltreatment will not necessarily prevent them from growing altogether. This is just as well, since I am almost guaranteed to maltreat most of the plants I am starting to grow, more through ignorance than deliberate neglect.

Here’s a tip: when you plant crocuses, as per the packet instructions, in rows of 3 inch spacing, they don’t look right. It has much the same effect as if you were to line up ducklings in military rows and tell them not to move; they would soon get fidgety and try to flock back into a gaggle. I’m not sure what the answer is – do I now replant the crocuses into groups, so they look more ‘natural’, or next year could I plant the bulbs in groups to start with so that they come up in pretty clumps? I can hear you snickering behind your hand at this amateur question, but please remember that in the school of gardening, I’m firmly in the nursery class. No pun intended.

Buoyed by the sight of these cheerful little flowers, I decided it was time to clear out the decrepit greenhouse. Unfortunately the task turned out to be pretty traumatic. I do realise that my dislike of creepy, slimy things might be something I’m going to have to deal with if I’m going to take this gardening malarkey seriously. But honestly, did they have to gang up like that? I found no less that EIGHTEEN snails on the underside of one plank of wood, being frogmarched into formation by a spider roughly the size of a rugby ball. After an understandably lengthy period of hysteria, I held my breath and chucked them, plank and all, in the black bin.

Clear out complete, I planted up some more seeds. The problem with announcing that you are taking up gardening is that kindly friends and family immediately give you gifts of seeds, but you have nothing to put them in. So, a few weeks ago put in a large order of seed trays and pots from Victoriana Nurseries. They are made from tough polystyrene, so should last a while, and are all recycled, making them ‘happy’ pots (I think that’s the technical term). I also bought some magic organic plant stimulant, enough to cover 1250 square metres, which should keep me going a while. Well, it will keep my plants going; I’m not planning on drinking the stuff myself, though the ingredients list looks similar to your average detox diet and would probably do me some good. Spring cleaning all round, eh?

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